Court of Appeal for Ontario

Date: February 13, 2017 Docket: C60497 Panel: MacPherson, Rouleau and Brown JJ.A.

Between

Her Majesty the Queen Respondent

and

Anastasios Karaisaridis Appellant

Counsel

Anastasios Karaisaridis, acting in person Delmar Doucette, duty counsel Yael Pressman, for the respondent

Heard and released orally: February 8, 2017

Appeal Information

On appeal from the conviction entered on April 2, 2015 and the sentence imposed on April 27, 2015 by Justice Wolfram Tausendfreund of the Superior Court of Justice, sitting without a jury.

Endorsement

[1] The appellant appeals his conviction for the possession of cocaine for the purposes of trafficking. He advances two main submissions.

[2] First, the appellant submits the trial judge erred in finding he was in possession and control over the basement where a significant amount of the cocaine was found. The trial judge examined the evidence regarding possession and control over the basement at page 16 of his judgment (Appeal Book, at p. 115). Based on his review of the evidence, the trial judge concluded: "To suggest that the basement was beyond his control and that activity may have been carried on by third parties unknown to him of which he was not aware stretches credulity beyond what I can accept." In our view, that conclusion was open to the trial judge.

[3] The appellant represented himself at trial. As his second ground of appeal from conviction, the appellant submits that given the state of his mental health at the time of the trial, the trial judge should not have permitted him to conduct his defence. He also submits there were Charter motions he wished to bring that, in light of his mental health condition at the time, he was unable to. We note that at the end of his trial the appellant stated to the trial judge that "my faith in the justice system has been upheld, sir. I believe you to be very fair and tried to assist me in getting through this case." Moreover, there is no fresh evidence before us to enable us to assess his argument that his mental health condition at the trial prevented him from presenting a full defence. We do not give effect to this submission.

[4] Accordingly, the appeal from conviction is dismissed.

[5] The appellant also appeals his sentence. Duty counsel concedes the sentence of 5 years, less time served, falls within a proper range of sentences. However, duty counsel submits the trial judge made two errors in imposing that sentence. First, he submits the trial judge erred by failing to give proper effect to the 10-year gap between possession convictions in Napanee, and the present conviction. The trial judge clearly recognized that there was a 10-year gap between those convictions: Appeal Book, at p. 125. He obviously took the gap into account in assessing the appropriate range of sentence.

[6] Duty counsel also submits the trial judge ignored the mental health issues encountered by the appellant while in custody after his arrest. He submits enhanced credit should be given because of the failure of the custodial institution to deal with those mental health issues. Duty counsel points to the letter submitted by the appellant's wife at the sentencing hearing that described some of those issues.

[7] We would not give effect to this argument. The appellant was represented by counsel at the sentencing hearing. The credit for pretrial custody is in the discretion of the judge, who gave him 1.5. We see no basis for appellate intervention. The appeal from sentence is dismissed.

J.C. MacPherson J.A. Paul Rouleau J.A. David Brown J.A.